Civil Procedure

Expert Discovery Expert discovery is the part of civil discovery devoted to witnesses who may offer specialized knowledge, technical opinions, scientific conclusions, professional judgments, or other expert evidence at trial. It is different from ordinary fact-witness discovery because expert testimony can substantially shape how a court understands complex evidence. In Read more

Depositions Depositions are one of the most important forms of discovery in civil litigation. A deposition allows a party’s attorney to question a witness under oath before trial, with the testimony recorded by a court reporter or through another authorized method. The witness answers questions orally, and the resulting testimony Read more

Requests for Admission Requests for admission are a discovery tool used to establish facts that are not genuinely disputed, authenticate documents, and narrow the issues that must be proved at trial. Instead of asking an opposing party to produce evidence or answer a series of factual questions, a request for Read more

Requests for Production Requests for production are one of the most important tools in civil discovery. They allow one party to require another party to produce documents, electronically stored information, tangible things, or other materials relevant to the claims and defenses in a lawsuit. They can also be used to Read more

Interrogatories Interrogatories are written questions that one party in a civil lawsuit serves on another party as part of the discovery process. The responding party must generally answer the questions in writing and under oath, unless a valid objection applies. In federal civil litigation, interrogatories are governed primarily by Rule Read more

Scope of Discovery The scope of discovery determines what information a party to a civil lawsuit may obtain from another party during the pretrial process. In federal civil litigation, the central rule is Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(b)(1), which generally permits discovery of nonprivileged matter that is relevant to Read more

What Is Discovery? Discovery is the pretrial process through which parties to a civil lawsuit obtain information, documents, electronically stored information, testimony, and other evidence from one another and, in appropriate circumstances, from nonparties. Discovery is intended to allow the parties to investigate the facts, identify the evidence that matters, Read more

Class Certification What Is Class Certification? Class certification is the court’s formal determination that a lawsuit may proceed as a class action under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23. A lawsuit does not become a class action merely because the complaint says that the plaintiff intends to represent a class. Read more

Class Actions What Is a Class Action? A class action is a civil lawsuit in which one or more representative parties litigate on behalf of a larger group of people who have claims or defenses sharing legally significant characteristics. Instead of requiring every affected person to file an individual lawsuit, Read more